Sisters and Brothers
by Gelles
Summary: The last thing Mikilah wanted on her egg hunt was her little brother tagging along. So, naturally, the first thing that happens is...  World of Warcraft


Sisters and Brothers  
A World of Warcraft fanfic  
By Kristin Renee Taylor

#

Children will be children. You really can't change that.

"Miki! Miki, wait up!"

Siblings will be siblings, and you really can't change that, either.

"C'mon, Miki, slow down! I- I can't keep up with you!"

Mikilah Forestsong stopped walking so abruptly that Roh, almost running to keep up with the much taller elf, careened into her back. He flailed and caught her wrist before he fell over. She looked down at him, doubled-over with exertion and labored breathing. Her lips thinned into a line of disapproval. "What do you want, Roh?"

He looked up at his sister, bright eyes shining. "Take me with you."

She jerked her arm free of his grasp. "Go home, Roh."

"Mama says you have to take me with you."

"I don't _have_ to take you anywhere," Miki snarled. "Go play with Fin."

"Fin's busy. He's got _chores_." The young elf hung his head low, working his boot into the dirt, but his silver eyes cast their gaze in her direction. "If you don't take me with you, I'll tell Mama what you and Tatl were doing in Papa's shed last night."

Mikilah turned a shade of darker grey. She covered it beneath a sneering glare. "You have no idea what we were doing."

He called her bluff by wrapping his arms around his chest and making exaggerated kissing noises into the air.

Miki's hands twitched at her sides, even while her mortification at her brother's "re-enactment" continued. And then a different reason kicked in. "You little brat! You were spying on us!" She took a swipe at him, which he ducked under easily and ran a few paces away, out of arms-length. "Take me with you."

"No!"

"Then I'll tell Mama what you did with Tatl and Papa's fishing tack-"

"Fine!" Miki threw her hands up, defeated. "Fine, you can come with us. Just… shut up!"

Mikilah spun away and stalked through the forest. She knew that little brothers would be little brothers, but for the moment she really wished she could change that. She shook her head, muttering beneath her breath about her bad luck. And the need to fix the door latch on her father's shed.

"Where are we going?" Roh asked.

Miki shook her head. She shrugged a shoulder, settling the weight of a full quiver and the shortbow into a more comfortable position on her back. "Hunting."

"Hunting what?"

"Tatl said she found a hippogryph clutch. We're going to get some eggs."

"To eat?"

"No, you idiot." She sneered over her shoulder. "You don't eat hippogryph eggs. You trade them."

"For what?"

She shrugged again. "I don't know. Whatever we can trade them for. "

"Oh." The next few steps passed in blissful silence. Then, "Like what?"

"Look, either shut up or go home! You'll scare away half the forest if you don't keep quiet."

"I think it's a bit late for that." The voice, so unexpected and close, made Roh loose a terrified bleat. He pressed closer to his sister, wide eyes scanning the forest to either side of them for possible threats, while his hands busied themselves clutching her arm tight enough to hurt. Mikilah, for her part, released a faint sigh of annoyance. She looked up. "You're scaring him."

"Then he shouldn't scare so easily," Tatl said. The dark-skinned elf lounged at her ease in the lower branches, reclining against the trunk of a tree while she pared the skin from a green apple. Like Mikilah, she wore light hunting leathers in muted blues and greens, the better to blend in with the dark forest, and a pair of gloves were tucked into her belt, alongside a longer knife. She cast a smile to Roh. "Brave hunters mustn't jump at every shadow, little one. Remember that we are the ones that rule the forest."

Roh puffed himself up, bony chest protruding. "I'm not little!"

Tatl's grin was a slash of white. "Tell me that when you've overshot your sister, sprout." Tatl's knife embedded itself into the grass at Miki's feet, and the elf herself followed with a soft thump as she dropped off the branch. Miki tugged the knife free and handed it to her friend.

Tatl raked her gaze up and down Roh while she chewed her apple. "Will he be trouble?"

"No more than usual," Miki said. She fixed Roh with a stare that turned the statement into a threat. In response, Roh stuck his tongue out at her. Miki hid her smile to turn back to her friend. "Thinking about the crevice?" Tatl nodded. Miki shrugged. "He doesn't have gloves."

"He won't need gloves," Tatl said. She looked down at Roh, watching the two older elves with wide eyes and open curiosity. "What do you say, sprout? Would you like to join us on our little adventure?"

Roh's eyes, impossible though it seemed, went wider. He nodded.

Miki opened her mouth to protest, but Tatl touched her hip and her voice died on a soft hitch of breath and a flush that suffused her entire face. Goddess, would she ever stop reacting like that whenever Tatl was near? She hoped so, it was fast growing annoying. Perfectly aware of the effect she had produced in her friend, Tatl smirked at Mikilah, ignoring the hooded stare Miki returned. She stepped away from the siblings, tossing her violet hair and pitching the apple core into the woods.

"Come on then. Let's go while the night's still young."

* * *

Forests end; either they faded into plains or ran into oceans, but eventually they all ended. The particular stretch of forest that the trio journeyed through ended not at a plain or an ocean, but at a cliff wall. And it didn't so much as end as-

Roh craned his head back, looking up at the sheer rock face that stretched up, beyond the canopy. "Are we really going up there?"

"It's not that hard, more like a giant step," Miki said. Tatl, a length of rope knotted around her waist, was already scaling a tree that bordered the rock wall. "This whole area used to be flat land and continuous forest, but an earthquake shifted the landscape and lifted one whole section up higher than the other." Kneeling, she tied the free end of the rope around Roh's waist, checking to make sure the knots would hold. "There are a lot of handholds and, higher up, there are the roots from the trees at the top of the cliff to hold on to. We'll climb this tree to about halfway up, and then jump over to the cliff and climb that."

"I'm scared, Miki."

She ruffled his hair, a darker green then her own. "Don't be. That's what this is for." She gave the rope a final tug. "The nest isn't far, just above the tree line. Tatl will climb to the top of the cliff and serve as your anchor. The worse that can happen is that you'll lose your grip and bruise yourself against the wall, but you can't fall."

"You don't have a rope."

"Mm. True. Originally there was supposed to be just the two of us, but we changed that plan. You're smaller than I am, so you'll be able to reach the eggs more easily." She sat cross-legged, the better to look her brother in the eyes. "You sure you still want to do this? You can wait for us down here."

He considered it solemnly, arms folded and eyes squeezed shut in unconscious mimicry of their father's thinking pose. Finally, he nodded once. "I'll do it."

She smiled. "Okay, then, weed. Up you go."

He trotted behind her and climbed onto her back, arms around her neck and legs around her waist. Miki hoisted herself up with a grunt. Scaling the tree was the least of her difficulties, even with a young boy clinging to her back. The bark was rough under her bare hands, offering more than enough purchase. She ascended swiftly, aware of the shrinking slack of rope as Tatl, unburdened, gained a greater lead.

The ground had since vanished in a web of interlaced branches when Roh squeaked, and she felt the tug of the rope through his small frame. Tatl's hissed warning drifted down from above. Miki caught hold of a branch and pulled them onto it where she sat, straddling the wood. She tapped Roh's arm. "Off."

"What is it?" He asked as he released his grip on his sister. He crouched on the branch, one hand clinging to the trunk. Miki cast her gaze upwards as she unslung her bow and put an arrow to the string, though she did not draw it. "The mother. We've been watching for a few days now, to learn her schedule. She always leaves to feed just before dawn."

In the shifting shadows of the early morning, keen elven eyes picked out what had given Tatl pause: the outline of a large animal making slow, lazy circles in the sky above them. The shadow of the hippogryph drifted along the canopy roof, twin moons casting a hazy silhouette of the beast onto the leaves below.

Above her, crouched on a branch so high up that it looked too thin to hold her weight, Tatl lifted a hand: _Wait_.

Miki beckoned to Roh. When he shuffled closer, she whispered, "See how the branch butts up against the rock wall, and the ivy has spread along the surface?" He nodded. "You and Tatl will transition to the wall. You'll climb on your own from here. I will be below you. You're small enough to get into the crevice where the nest is and, when you do, you'll take the eggs and put them into this sack." Miki untied a mesh sack from her waist and slung it across his shoulders like a satchel. "Take all but two. Got it?"

Roh drew a deep breath, puffing his chest out. He grinned. "I got it."

"Good boy." She mussed his hair.

They waited In silence as the moons gradually set. The sky lightened, the disc of the sun slipped above the horizon to light the forest with warm fire. The hippogryph, unaware of the elven threat lurking below, let loose a shrill cry and broke off her patrol, soaring for distant hunting grounds.

Miki slung her bow across her back. "Now, little brother."

Tatl had alternated between watching the hippogryph and waiting for Miki. When the green-haired elf re-slung her bow and pulled herself to the next highest branch, she leapt nimbly to the cliff wall, hands and feet finding easy purchase against the worn stone. Under Miki's watchful eye, Roh crept along his branch until the wood begin to sag beneath even his smaller weight still a good three or four feet from the rock. He backed up to stable footing and surveyed the distance with open dismay. He looked up at Tatl.

Miki swallowed a sigh. She held a hand out to her brother, a silent command to stay still. She would have to climb back over to him and boost him the final feet, a feat she wasn't sure the slender wood would tolerate farther away from the trunk.

Her brother surprised her by stepping off the branch into the air.

"Roh!" She cried out, then bit her lip and nearly fell in her amazement as the rope snapped taut between Tatl and Roh, and the boy swung like a leather-clad pendulum towards the cliff. He caught an outreaching vine with one hand, scrambled for and found a better grip. A moment later, he had both hands knotted into the overgrowth and his feet planted solidly, secure on the cliff wall.

He looked over his shoulder, seeking out Miki, and flashed her a giddy smile. Above, Tatl sent her friend an amused smirk and a raised eyebrow. _Did you doubt me? _ Her cocky grin asked.

Miki glared at them both until her heartbeat returned to a more sedate pace. She jerked her head up in a gesture of impatience. She could tell Tatl was laughing by the silent shake of her friend's shoulders as she started her ascent, Roh in tow.

Miki checked her gear as first her friend then her brother vanished above the tree line. She wasn't concerned with her arrows; a wax tablet in the base of the quiver would ensure no accidental spillage, but moreover she wouldn't be able to use her bow while scaling the cliff. Her father's fishing knife was more important. Normally used for cutting tangled lines and gutting fish, she wore it strapped to her right thigh. She checked one last time to make sure the securing strap kept it from falling free of the sheath, nodded, and stood. Three long, loping strides and a leap took her to the rock wall, and she begin her climb.

Unencumbered by her brother's weight, she scaled the cliff swiftly. The easy purchase of the vines dwindled away to weather-worn craggy rock. Hand and foot holds were plentiful, and she was glad she and Tatl had a test climb the day before as she knew now which areas to avoid or where to place her feet.

At the tree line she stopped to gather her bearings.

The cliff extended another several hundred feet above her, the edge obscured by creeping vines and thick tree roots that had busted through the rock from the forest above. A narrow cleft, gouged into the rock face from weather and time, formed a dark slash of shadow against the otherwise pale stone. The crevice was too narrow for a full-grown adult hippogryph, leading Miki to surmise that the mother had a separate entrance to her nest, but a night of searching had been fruitless.

The crevice was, however, large enough for a night elf youth. And where Miki could fit with modest difficulty, Roh could go with ease. The young boy was already beside the narrow defile, straddling a thickened branch of brushwood that had attempted to grow on the rock wall and died on the inhospitable terrain. He smiled at Miki, and waved as she negotiated the rock wall towards him. The rope extended up into the darkness of the crevice.

"You okay?" She called up to him.

Roh nodded. "Tatl said to wait here until she gives the signal." He swung his legs. "This is fun! I've never been so high up before." He pointed into the distance. " I can see the ocean. If we had father's glass, we could probably see the boats. Do you think we can come back up here? With father's looking glass, I mean. How far do you think we could see? I bet we could see all the way to the end of the world!"

As Miki gained closed to the deadwood where her brother perched, Tatl's face appeared at the top of the cliff. She whistled an all-clear. Roh broke off his stream patter in surprise. He looked around, then up at the elf.

Miki rolled her eyes. Wedging a fist into a small gap in the stone to anchor herself, she waved her free hand at Tatl. "Okay, weed, that's your cue. You remember what to do?" He nodded and lifted the sack across his shoulders. She cautioned him again. "All but two."

"I know, I know." He fussed, eager to get on with the next part of his adventure. Under Miki's watchful gaze, Roh slipped off the deadwood and slid into the crevice. The darkness of the rock swallowed him. Miki followed a few feet behind, climbing high enough to where she could maneuver her longer frame into the crevice without getting stuck on the sides. Secure enough, she leaned her head back against the cool, damp stone, content to rest while she strained to hear signs of her brother's rustling movements.

"Roh? How are you doing, little brother?"

A moment of silence, then a gasp. "These are the biggest eggs I've ever seen!"

"Can you reach them?"

"Yes. I think I can. Hold on." More rustling and the dry sounds of sticks snapping. "Okay. I can get them."

"Start putting them in the sack."

"They're heavy. And warm!"

"Roh."

"I said got it!"

Miki bit her lower lip before she could say something stupid and make Roh uncooperative. Instead she turned her attention outwards, to where the sun was just beginning to peek its way above the distant glimmer of the ocean, turning the treetops below into a sea of waving greens, dappled with shadows. Miki squinted against the unfamiliar light. She leaned out of the crevice as far as she could, taking in the rare sight of her home in a vastly different angle.

Tatl released a sharp whistle just as something brushed Miki's back. She jumped, half-fumbling for her knife. Roh's delighted peal of laughter instantly plunged her back into annoyance. "I got you!" He crowed. "Scaredy-cat."

Miki shifted her body, enough to be able to look behind her at her brother's smiling face, dappled by the sunlight that streamed past Miki's arms. "You didn't get me. And I wasn't scared."

"Were too."

"Was not."

"You jumped."

"Weed." Miki growled. She gestured to the deeper portion of the crevice with a jut of her chin. "You get the eggs?" Roh dragged the sack in front of him and beamed. Miki grinned back. "Good. Now let's get out of here." Bracing herself with her feet on either side of the crevice walls and one hand, Miki leaned back and out, searching for a handhold so she could pull her lower body free.

"Miki!" Tatl screamed. "Stop!"

Miki looked up at Tatl, then further up as her dove friend back, out of sight. Talons outstretched, the hippogryph rushed past Tatl's position in an accelerating dive.

Miki stared at the beast. "It's not supposed to be back yet." And then her eyes widened. "Roh, Get back to the nest!"

"What?"

She heaved herself back inside, barely refrained from shoving him into crevice. She braced herself against the crevice's sides, blocking entry. She ducked her head. Roh's eyes were wide and bright in the sudden shadow. "Miki?"

Shrieks and wind. The hippogryph dove past the crevice. Talons raked her back, ripping through leather and flesh with terrible ease, leaving agonizing pain. One hoof smashed into the rock wall near her left arm hard enough to send shards of stone flying. And then the only sound was Miki's short, gasping whimpers.

Roh burst into frightened tears.

Miki jerked her head up. "Sto- Roh! Stop-" Her voice slurred. She was bleeding, bleeding enough for a stream of red to run down her legs. She forced herself to keep talking. "Take the eggs. Put them… return…" She fainted.

Consciousness returned seconds later, when her back hit the rock wall and the explosion of pain jerked awake, screaming. She was dangling upside down, her right calf wedged into the crevice all that kept her from plunging down to the forest floor. Blood from her lacerated back ran down her arms, flicked away in red droplets from the wind. Over the roaring in her head she could hear another sound, Roh's hiccupping sobs.

She mumbled Roh's name and tried to reach above her, struggling to lift her arm enough to make a grab for a rock. Everything, every part of her, was so heavy. She flopped back, breathing hard and dizzy. Dangling, she forced her eyes to focus on the shadow moving across the sky.

The hippogryph was coming straight for her.

She threw her arms up in an attempt to shield her face. The gesture was futile; the animal's hooves slammed into the rockwall just above her body, its wings beating furiously to keep it aloft. It shrieked in rage and dug into the crevice with its talons, trying to snatch out Roh. Her brother's cries turned to screams.

Miki caught the hippogryph's hoof and hauled herself up. She rammed her knife upwards, into the beast's exposed and vulnerable rear. The hippogryph screeched. Dark liquid sprayed into the air. Miki shoved the knife further, twisting with all of her remaining strength. The hippogryph spasmed, kicking at her, dislodging her leg and hand with its thrashing.

Miki made a desperate grab for the hippogryph's tail. Her fingers brushed the strands of dark hair, and then she was freefalling, tumbling through the air. She caught the barest glance of the hippogryph, blood showering from its rear, soar away from the crevice.

She was unconscious before she hit the first branch.

* * *

Mikilah woke up to voices instead of pain.

She was lying on her stomach. She opened her left eye. Everything was dark. Smeared. Heavy. She closed her eye again.

The next time she opened her eye, the light was different. Patterns on the wall. Sunlight. Daytime. She closed her eye.

And opened both of her eyes to the sound of drums. Rain. Water. She was thirsty. Her tongue felt swollen and was stuck to the roof of her mouth. She moaned low in her throat, and even that act set off a dull pain deep in her chest.

A face appeared. Someone crouched beside her. Violet hair and dark skin. The features sharp and avian and puffy from crying. Words were said. Miki strove to find the meaning in the sounds, but the headache made her head feel like it was splitting in half. She slipped away into cooler darkness.

When time brought her back around, there were more people with her. She turned her head. The girl with the raven hair, an older woman and man, and another woman in a white robe. This woman noticed Miki first, and bent over her, brushing slim fingers against Miki's forehead. She didn't feel the gesture; she didn't feel anything except a dull pain radiating through her body. Her mind offered the notion that she might be drugged, but the meaning of the word spilled through her grasping mental fingers.

The woman in the white robe turned to the other two adults and spoke to them in soothing, hopeful tones. The adults turned towards Miki, the woman started crying even while she smiled, and Miki was struck by a sense of familiarity. But something was wrong. She couldn't figure out what, and it made everything hurt. The red wave rose and swept her away.

Mikilah opened her eyes. She was in her bedroom, and the slant of the sun put the time just around mid-morning. Parts of her throbbed, her back mostly, but more sharply along the right side of her body. The effort to roll onto her left side left her sweating and panting, but feeling strangely victorious. She took stock of herself.

Both of her legs were wrapped and splinted. Her right arm, too, had been splinted, and bound tightly to her chest to keep it and her right shoulder from moving. Miki let herself roll onto her back and the wave of pain nearly made her pass out again. She clung to consciousness, breathing through clenched teeth, until the worst of the pain had passed. She left her left arm: bruised a sickly purple and yellow, but considering the rest of her, miraculously intact. Questing fingers touched the bandage crowning her head.

"Miki?"

The boy stood in her doorway, eyes wide as he stared at her. One of his hands were bandaged.

She stared at him.

Tears filled his eyes. Wailing, he flung himself across the room and into her bed, bony arms wrapping around her neck as he sobbed against her shoulder. Her hisses of pain made him release her as if he had been burned. He wiped his nose with a sleeve. "I'm sorry."

The words made sense, but she couldn't understand why. She dug out her voice. "Why?"

He looked down, ashamed. "I left the eggs."

"Eggs?"

He nodded without looking at her, thin shoulders shaking as he tried to cry quietly. "You were in the tree, and I wanted to get you down, but Tatl, she said we couldn't move you, so we got Mama and Papa and they got a Priestess and we brought you home and I forgot the eggs. You're mad at me, aren't you?"

"Mad at you?" She echoed, unable to grasp the context of the bizarre conversation.

"You _are_ mad at me." He sagged. "I'm sorry, Miki."

"Mad at… eggs?" Miki felt the headache spiking, driving between her right eye. "Hippogryph eggs?"

The boy nodded. "I left them behind. I'm really sorry. I know how much-"

"Idiot." She whispered. Roh flinched. She ignored it to wrap an arm around his body, pulling him close against her. She pressed her face into his hair, eyes filling with tears. "You idiot. We nearly get killed and you think I'm angry with you over _eggs_? I'm not mad at you."

He lifted his head. "You're not?"

She shook her head, ignoring the flashes of pain the movement brought. "No, sprout. I'm happy, so very happy, that you're alive and safe."

Now it was Roh's turn to look confused. "Why wouldn't I be? You're my big sister." When Miki looked at him, puzzled, he added, "Big sisters protect little brothers. It's what they do."

Miki's laugh was raw. She hugged Roh to her again. "I guess we do. Let's not change that, okay?"

"Okay."

#

((Mikilah would later go on to become my level 80 Night Elf Warrior. For the time being, however, she's just happy to be alive. :D))


End file.
